1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a climatic cabinet or storage cabinet with an upper zone and a lower zone, and storage positions for storing objects in one of the lower and upper zone.
2. Discussion of Background Information
With the increasing degree of automation in medical engineering, there is a rising need to be able to manage substances from long-term storage automatically. To avoid chemical changes in the substances, they are often stored at the lowest temperatures possible. The temperature ranges below −80° C. are of increasing importance here. The transport of storage articles at these extremely low temperatures makes special demands on the mechanics and control of a storage system.
Known systems use a transport robot that is arranged in a moveable manner in an aisle between shelves with drawers. The robot is able to pull out the drawers and remove the contents therefrom. The robot thereupon moves to a periphery at the end of the aisle. The robot thereby moves between the shelves only when access takes place. The region of the periphery has a higher temperature than the region of the racks.
Another system, which is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,694,767, has cassettes arranged in a chest that can be drawn out vertically. A gripper removes the storage articles from the drawn-out container and transports them to the periphery. The upper region of the arrangement is warmer than the lower.
The disadvantage of the known systems is that either they are suitable exclusively for large storage facilities, or that they leave a large amount of space unused. Furthermore, with the known arrangements it is not easy to integrate processing devices in a space-saving manner while maintaining the footprint.